


Home

by colorfulCheshire



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Comfort, Domestic, Fluff, M/M, Modern Fantasy AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 22:12:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9092746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colorfulCheshire/pseuds/colorfulCheshire
Summary: [Home is wherever I'm with you.]
Of clear skies and cool riverbeds and the hearts that had to leave them behind.  You may not be able to return to where you've come from, but as long as there's a place for you beneath his wings, you know that you'll always have somewhere to rest your weary head.





	

**Author's Note:**

> In a short-lived roleplay I had up at one time, my partner introduced for that story, the idea of a [fossegrim](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fossegrim) Cronus. It's been a hard concept to get out of my mind, even over a year later, and when added to my love of Kankri as an angel (or anything supernatural, really), well, this was born, albeit, quite a few months ago. There's no real "point" to the supernatural elements in an otherwise-modern setting, other than the fact that they just are, and that, well, this is a story about them.
> 
> **Suggested Listening:** [[Link]](http://www.infinitelooper.com/?v=z3u6FbLVSXM&p=n#/0;237)  
>  \- Congratulations by Blue October (instrumental version)

Spring is still cool outside your open balcony doors, a tentative breeze barely dancing among your loose curtains before managing to chill the skin of your exposed arms and neck. With your couch in the middle of the living room, you’re not as cold as you could be, but your body flinches in an involuntary shiver all the same. Warm muscles tense underneath your touch and you pause, letting your eyes follow the smooth skin of your boyfriend’s back up to where he’s looking at you over the curve of his bare shoulder, his expression reading mild concern in round eyes and slightly pursed lips.

He looks cute like this, you note, but, of course, he always looks cute. Maybe that’s why you don’t find much trouble in pressing the fingertips of one hand firmly into the curve of his shoulder blade, compressing a too-tense muscle and causing his wing on that side to flex suddenly, a curtain of white feathers raising between where the two of you have met eyes. He gasps, his voice breathy and something between a mix of pleasure and discomfort, but as you start to rub your fingers in small circles, it evens out into something more akin to relief and you feel a little less guilty over causing the initial discomfort.

“You know,” he murmurs after you’ve switched to half-drumming-half-prodding the area with your fingertips, playing an imaginary melody into his muscles. He seems to realize how quiet he is and starts again after clearing his throat, a bit louder and articulate as always, “You know I don’t mind getting up to close the door if you’re cold, Cronus.”

You hum a brief consideration, falling quiet for a beat as you trace your other hand up the bone of his wing, calloused fingers relishing in the too-soft warmth of downy feathers beneath your gliding touch. “I know,” you say simply, and then you lean in to press a kiss to where wispy white down meets skin the color of rain-washed pine. He lets you, leaning back into your touch just the slightest bit, and with the cool spring air around you, you wish you could just melt into him, he’s so perfect.

You warm your face against his back, nuzzling tingling cheeks between his shoulder blades, and you let your hands fall from the heat of soft skin and feathers to pull him closer against you with your arms around his waist. His shoulders rise and fall with a sigh, something you mimic in your pleasure before you find that he’s speaking again, drawing your attention away from the sleepy warmth enveloping your front.

“I’ll sit right back down if you let me close it,” he offers, wings stretching out on either side of you, the left as much as it can with the back of the couch in the way, as he moves to stand. You frown and cling to him, tugging him down before he can even fully push himself up from the cushions.

“You like the air,” you say when he grumbles your name under his breath and shakes his head.

“And you’re cold.” He shifts in your grip, turning, and you oblige, your arms loosening as you slip under one wing and an arm to reposition your arms around his shoulders where you press a kiss against one dark freckle.

“I’m fine, Kanni” you insist, another kiss drinking in his warmth.

“Ridiculous is what you are.” His voice is matter-of-fact as he gently removes your arms and stands.

You let yourself fall to the couch, wanting to complain more but your thoughts drown somewhere in an ocean of lost battles as Kankri stretches thin arms high above him, graceful wings folding up and stretching out wide in a fan of overlapping feathers. For a moment, you can catch the soft orange glow of the sunset illuminating the edges of long, large feathers, but then they’re folded away again as he drops his arms and moves to shut the open balcony door, leaving a few downy wisps whirling in the air in his wake. You watch them for a moment before your eyes drift back over to where black leggings are clinging to shapely hips that sway with each step and you’re not even sure if you know your own name right now.

It’s been well over a decade and you still can’t get over how beautiful he is. You don’t think you want to.

“There,” he says aloud with a definitive nod, his hand lingering on the metal handle where he’s slid the door firmly shut. Outside, past the slight silhouette of your lover, the sky is a soft, even blue –pink and orange just bleeding into the canvas at the darkening edges of flat roofs and sparse treetops.

Without the sharp angles and even lines of humanity and its cities, you can almost pretend that you’re back home, back before Kankri became your home, and instead of looking at the evening sky through meticulously cleaned glass, you’re again looking up from beneath the undisturbed surface of your lake to watch the rest of the world fade into night. Though, if you were back at your lake, Kankri wouldn’t be here with you, so you’d rather focus on him instead.

His eyes are on the sky as well, but you’re positive he’s not daydreaming of looking through the water’s surface – he still doesn’t know how to swim; you don’t know if he ever will.

“You miss it, don’t you,” you say without thinking as your eyes fall back to clear blue through the glass. He looks at the sky the same way you look at the tiny man-made pond decorating the front of your apartment complex, the same way you stop and stare whenever the two of you drive past the dirt road leading down to the lake and its camping grounds. You watch his wings twitch, and you can’t help but to wonder if it’s the same as the fins that you never use anymore that ache for the rush of water over glossy scales.

“I don’t remember anything about it.” His half answer is quiet and pensive like the small frown you catch in his profile when he turns his head, and it makes your heart ache in an entirely different way. He turns from the window now and you feel guilty for interrupting his moment to himself and the shadows of his intangible memories, but you can’t change that now, so instead you reach out for him, taking his hands when he returns to the couch and tugging his small, light frame far too easily onto your lap.

“I know,” you sigh, leaning in to press your lips to his neck as you steal the warmth from where his skin is pressed against yours, your forgotten laundry day leaving the both of you underdressed for the early spring outside. “But you still miss it. You’ll always miss home.”

You feel a faint twitch of muscles beneath your lips when he swallows, but he says nothing for a long time. Instead, his arms wrap around your shoulders, palms resting against a shoulder blade and in your hair and wings casting dim shadows over you, and right now it feels like you really could just melt into him. The two of you sit like this for a while beneath his wings, his legs on either side of yours and your chests pressed together, and you feel yourself drifting off where you’re nuzzling his skin when he does speak, voice quiet in a way that makes the rest of time come to a delicate standstill.

“When-“ he stops almost immediately, hesitating before starting again, his fingers tensing over your skin and in your hair. “When does it stop? I… It feels so wrong to miss something I don’t know anything about that I don’t know how I lost in the first place and I just…” He trails off, with what’s likely far too many thoughts rolling around in that pretty head of his for him to actually put into words and more than anything you wish you had all the answers he could ever want, because it hurts to see him torn up like this.

“I know, baby.” You kiss his skin and shift your body, sitting up now to lean back against the couch as his wings shift away to keep from being pinned. They fan out to the side of him, giving one more gentle stretch before they fold up behind him. In another moment, they’re only a mass of a feathers that disperse quickly and fade into the sun’s dying light just like dust, leaving you with a rather defeated-looking Kankri slumping forward onto your chest, his sleight frame somehow even smaller without his wings. You let your arms wrap around his waist, hanging loosely over the prominent curve in his hips, but you say nothing more because you don’t have an answer that will make him feel better, no matter how much you wish you did.

“How…” his voice goes small again as he hides against your chest, your skin tingling where hot tears fall against it and all you can do is pull your arms more securely around him. “How do you deal with it, knowing you can’t go back?” He seems scared to ask, to bring up what used to be painful memories for you, but really, you don’t mind, not when it’s for him. After all, it’s not like you haven’t had time to adjust.

“Most of us die with their rivers.” The fact doesn’t really affect you that much; rivers die, just like everything else. You feel him still against you, likely regretting bringing up the topic, but you’re fine, so you slide a hand up his back to pet his hair in hopes of soothing him, or maybe it’s to soothe both of you. “But mine was closed off into a lake long before you fell into it. It hurt then too, the homesickness, but one fossegrim alone can’t save a dying river, or even a dying lake.” Gods did you try, though. Your small stretch of wood was thought to be cursed for quite a few human generations. “I guess I had just come to terms with it after a while, even if I didn’t want to, but then, well, you came along.” You tighten your embrace for a moment, finding comfort in his weight, however little it may be, against you.

“What do you mean?” he pulls back from your chest just enough to look up at you, his eyes still glossy with wet tears, but instead of worrying that you’ll see, he gives you a scrutinizing, confused expression. You’ve seen him in worse states, just as he has with you, but it doesn’t stop the tight, dry feeling that squeezes your heart every time you see him crying.

You answer him with a kiss, leaning in to close the distance between your lips with a soft sigh. It doesn’t really answer his question, but he returns the gesture all the same, lips moving soft and careful against your own and you wonder if he’s giving you this for your sake, giving you a moment to breathe and to find comfort in the warmth he has to offer. When your lips part, his eyes open slowly to regard you with dark irises, the curious gleam there still quietly expecting an answer.

“You’re my home now, Kanni.” You peck the corner of his lips and you find that you still adore the way his blush tints sandy-colored cheeks to something akin to a deep sunset. You adore everything about him.

“I-I’m not a river,” he tries to say flatly, averting his eyes from you now and you can’t help but to laugh because he’s so damn perfect and you still think it’s a miracle that of all the lakes he could drop into, that it was yours. “Or any body of water for that matter…”

“You’re better than a river, babe.” And you mean that; you really do. Without Kankri, no river could ever be good enough to keep your heart from shriveling up alongside your once-beloved little lake, but in him, at least, you can find the safe comfort that you had lost and you can hide yourself in his embrace, away from the still new and very strange modern world.

You watch his eyes widen and his perfect, pillowy lips part as if in surprise. The expression only lasts for a moment though, his features softening into a shy smile, and you swear that somehow you’re falling even more in love with him as the seconds pass between you. You’re not even sure how long you’ve been watching him when he speaks, lips curving into a warmer smile even as moves to hide his face against your shoulder.

“And you’re better than the sky.” His voice is so quiet against you, low and thick with emotion, and for a moment, you’re young and new again, fresh water rushing over your scales and fins while you travel miles of untainted waters just because you can, because you’re free and unbound in your world to yourself.

But now you have Kankri, and somehow that’s so much better. It’s still hard to believe that the man in your arms is the same lost, confused, and wet angel that you had rescued from your waters what feels like an entire lifetime ago. He had been so scared, so closed off and wary of everything then. It feels more like a dream than a memory when compared to the warmth and trust that he shows you now.

You squeeze him in a tight hug, nose nuzzling dark curls and breathing in the scent of home and love and everything you could ever want. There’s a deep scar beneath where your fingers rest on his back, it and its twin on his other shoulder blade the only things to mar otherwise-unblemished skin, the only thing connecting him to a past he doesn’t remember. You absently trace the jagged line of it from tip to tip, stopping and laying your palm flat only when he starts to squirm beneath your touch, reminding you that you’re still holding him tightly against you. You relax your grip with a pleasant sigh, your wandering hand moving up to play with the soft hair at the back of his neck instead as he slumps against you, his body fitting perfectly with yours, as if the two of you didn’t come from two entirely different worlds.

“I love you so much, Kanni,” you tell him softly, because you like to tell him every chance you get, because you can never say it enough when he’s so perfect and when he’s given you everything. He nuzzles into your neck, not answering immediately, but his voice is soft and relieved when he does speak.

“Thank you, Cronus.” His breath tickles your skin, his lips twitching into his soft smile against you, and you want to hold him like this until the end of time itself. “You mean the world to me, dear.” He’s too good to you and you never want to let him go.

Being with Kankri feels like what you imagine flying must feel like, but more than that… being with Kankri feels like home.

**Author's Note:**

> Personal Notes Ahoy:
> 
> This started out as a drabble with a purpose I don't quite recall, if there ever had been a purpose or theme in the first place. When I returned to it after an absolutely awful year, I found myself with a separating family, a house being lost, a broken friendship, and in general, the loss of most of my foundation for what I once called home. I've always been rather rootless, moving quite often and drifting from friends in the natural way that happens when lives don't physically overlap any longer, but now that that foundation is gone, the floating/falling feeling leaves me scrambling for purchase on what feels like nothing. I know that's not entirely true, but I think that it would be nice to have something of a foundation again.
> 
> So what started out just another aimless drabble of Cronus admiring Kankri and everything from the way he sighs to the way he always strives, always pushes towards his goals and the answers he desires, well, as you can see, it turned into thoughts of home and what that means, what that really feels like. I don't know if I have that currently, but I remember what it was like. Nothing will ever be the same, I know, but maybe that's a part of growing up or a part of life, as Cronus here has accepted, even if it's still a reluctant acceptance. 
> 
> After all, you'll always miss home.


End file.
